1911 First Edition Illustrated by Pre-Raphaelite Eleanor Fortescue Brickdale - Legend of King Arthur - Idylls of the King.

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 (Description)  

 

Author: Lord Alfred Tennyson. Eleanor Fortescue Brickdale, illustrator.
Title: Idylls of the King Illustrated in Colour by Eleanor Fortescue Brickdale.
Publisher: New York & London: Hodder & Stoughton, 1911. First American Illustrated Edition by Eleanor Fortescue Brickdale. 
Language: Text in English.
Size: 10.5 " X 8.5 ".
Pages: 173 pages.
Binding: Attractive and very good original gilt decorated binding (hinges fine, overall slightly scuffed and worn- as shown) under a protective removable mylar cover. 
Content: Good to very good content (bright, tight, and clean, some foxing mainly on the preliminary and last pages - as shown, some toning to endpaper - as shown, gift note from a previous 1911 owner on the first endpaper - as shown).
Illustrations: Complete with the 21 wonderful mounted plates by Eleanor Fortescue Brickdale.

Estimate: (USD 400 - USD 650)

The book: Rare and attractive First Illustrated Edition by Pre-Raphaelite artist Eleanor Fortescue Brickdale of Idylls of the King by Tennyson.

Idylls of the King, published between 1859 and 1885, is a cycle of twelve narrative poems by the English poet Alfred, Lord Tennyson (1809–1892; Poet Laureate from 1850) which retells the legend of King Arthur, his knights, his love for Guinevere and her tragic betrayal of him, and the rise and fall of Arthur's kingdom.

The author: Alfred Tennyson, 1st Baron Tennyson FRS (6 August 1809 – 6 October 1892) was a British poet. He was the Poet Laureate during much of Queen Victoria's reign and remains one of the most popular British poets of all time.

The illustrator:  Eleanor Fortescue-Brickdale (25 January 1872 – 10 March 1945) was an English artist known for her paintings, book illustrations, and a number of works in stained glass. Fortescue-Brickdale was born at her parents' house, Birchamp Villa in Upper Norwood, Surrey as Mary Eleanor Fortescue Brickdale the daughter of Matthew and Sarah Fortescue Brickdale. Her father was a barrister. She was trained first at the Crystal Palace School of Art, under Herbert Bone and entered the Royal Academy Schools in 1896. In that year she also exhibited a work at the Royal Academy, RA, and won a prize for designing a lunette, Spring for the RA Dining Room. Her first major painting was The Pale Complexion of True Love (1899). She soon began exhibiting her oil paintings at the Royal Academy, and her watercolours at the Dowdeswell Gallery, where she had several solo exhibitions.
While at the academy, Fortescue-Brickdale came under the influence of John Byam Liston Shaw, a protégé of John Everett Millais much influenced by John William Waterhouse. When Byam Shaw founded his art school in 1911, Fortescue-Brickdale became a teacher there.
In 1909, Ernest Brown, of the Leicester Galleries, commissioned a series of 28 watercolour illustrations to Tennyson's Idylls of the King, which Fortescue-Brickdale painted over two years. They were exhibited at the gallery in 1911, and 24 of them were published the following year in a deluxe edition of the first four Idylls.
Later, she also worked with stained glass. She was a staunch Christian, and donated works to churches. Amongst her best known works are The Uninvited Guest and Guinevere. She died on 10 March 1945, and is buried at Brompton Cemetery, London.